Tag: 9100

Hey everyone! I wanted to share a few photos and thoughts after seeing and riding the new Shimano Dura-Ace groupset. It features some really nice improvements and has some new tech that stays in line with the prior model.

The lever throw is significantly and noticeably less that 9000 and has a slightly crisper feeling to the shift. It reminded me of old school 9 speed Dura-Ace and how the lever actuation felt like there was a beginning and end to the throw for each shift. The hoods are redesigned as a single compound hood with some grip pattern in the right places. While it resembled the more ergo feel of Campagnolo, it had its own unique feel overall and was pleasant to hold on to.

The front derailleur is by far the most innovative piece of the system (other than the power integration with the cranksets, which I haven’t seen yet). It uses a separate spring tension to actuate the derailleur that is separately adjusted from the cable tension. It is kind of like having a built in inline barrel adjuster at the actual component rather than in the housing routing. It gets rid of the tall arm that was getting in the way of some gravel grinder frames in the 9000 series because it would rub the fatter tires (thus, most were coming spec’d with 10 speed front derailleurs).

The brakes are slightly more responsive and use a nicely redesigned cam action to open and close the brake for narrow or wide rims. It moves opposite to the prior models. The dial goes inward towards the brake rather than opening to the outside.

The crank looked slightly more molded and shaped to accommodate strong pedal forces in the downstroke while giving it a nice blacked out finish that might appeal some more than others.

Lastly, the rear derailleur seems to take a lot of its tech from the XTR derailleur. It now sports a shadow plus style mounting system, but doesn’t include the clutch (likely for weight savings0. A full carbon parallelogram holds the pulleys, which are different in size and closely resemble the slightly larger pulley on 11 speed 105 derailleurs.

Anyways, on to the photos, shown below. I’ll be adding a build review and other tech as we begin to install it in the shop in the weeks to come. Enjoy! Stop by and check it out! I’ll also being adding a few more detailed photos below in the next couple days as I have a chance to take it apart.